fall out
by Constance Greene
Summary: Karma will bite you in the ass. — AxelKairi


_xxx._

For **xxlovelycollision** ( previously myxbeautifulxlove )'s contest ;; _Axel x Kairi_.

**Confession** ;; I love this pairing to death. But at times I find it exceedingly difficult to write; to capture the two character's personalities in an affectionate relationship ( as many normal pairings are portrayed ) has yet to be something I've mastered. I hope it isn't too out of character ( this is one of my first attempts at AU, and I don't do so well at that ). And that it's something ( at least ) close to what you had in mind for the challenge, Loren. I can't help changing a pairing into a tragedy, or making them hardly ever interact with each other – it's a disease.

Oh, and nope, there aren't any _Akuroku_ references in this at _all. _( Cough. ) It's entirely your own interpretation . . .

Inspired by the song, _We've Got A Big Mess On Our Hands _by The Academy Is . . .

**Disclaimer** ;; Haha, no.

._xxx_

**F a** l l ; ; o _u t_

_If this wasn't our favourite eating spot, if I hadn't turned in that precise, forbidden, and utterly accidental direction right then, if I hadn't let Roxas talk me into getting the goddamned burgers . . . _He thought, a furrow of frustration working at his brow. _Then I never would have laid eyes on her._

There was a contradictory statement for each of those half-baked regrets, and he knew it. Hated the knowledge, but had to accept it anyway. Where else could they hang out and devour great quantities of not-quite-healthy-yet-certainly-filling food on Saturday nights? _Taco Bueno_? Definitely not Axel's pantry, which was dry but a few measly boxes of cereal every night.

Then he had to have turned – couldn't avoid it – because what was he going to do, spin around like a friggen ballerina and backtrack to the table? Maybe then she'd be gone around the corner, to the other side of the restaurant. It was unlikely, since she'd later only be a few tables away and across, not in the boonies like he bitterly hoped for.

Why they had to have switched duties on that odd and fateful night of gathering up the already paid for food, he didn't know. He could have been off to the soda fountain, his back turned, and never have to worry about her until two minutes later. That small reprieve would have been appreciated to his racing ( and completely nonfunctioning ) mind.

"I'll get the drinks," Roxas said, scooping the two nearly liter-sized blue-and-white cups into his arms and juggling them carefully, religiously, over to the drinking stand.

"'Kay." Axel responded off-handedly, as if already catching a whiff of the distraction advancing toward him. Maybe it was the perfume.

He slid his tray another foot to the right, and the movement was both graceful and precarious. Surely it would have been more fluid if the load was lighter, but it was currently weighed down with a pound of meat, an ounce of bun, and a surplus of mass from toppings. He was getting prepared for the take-off, and almost made it when the fire truck red tray suddenly and unexpectedly tilted, as if he weren't paying attention. He wasn't.

But he was paying attention to _something_.

Hair like autumn, eyes a daring blue, fringed with violet . . .

His heart rate began to go up, threatening a heart attack, and not because of clogged arteries after an evening meal of salty fries, sugar-laced Dr. Pepper, and burgers.

Porcelain skin, delicate features, petite build . . .

His heart beat a little faster.

"Axel? Can you help me a little here?" It was Roxas, over by the soda stand and trying to balance buckets of sloshing brown liquid against his chest. Some uncoiled from the supposedly still depths like a tidal wave and slopped over the side, a fragment of ice carried with it. "Crap, Axel." When Roxas gritted his teeth like that, you knew better than not to cooperate with him.

"Huh? . . . Sure." Still in a daze, the tall redhead reluctantly ripped his gaze away from the girl and sauntered clumsily over to his friend. The blonde looked at him just as cautiously, eyes flicking over his unsteady gait.

"I don't think it'd be much better . . ." But his voice trailed off, and he allowed Axel to take one of the giant drinks. Kudos to him, he didn't spill it.

"You're just a squirt, Roxas," The older male explained, semi-regaining his arrogant control. "You see, your arms are far too flabby to support such weight. I think we need to get you working out." His face brightened with a cheery grin, almost similar to the reaction that would occur if a flashlight was abruptly turned on and shone on his pale façade. Roxas didn't even will himself to speak; there would be no use. All he did was stare cryptically at the man's skeletal forelimbs, and then glance away sourly with a sound of disbelief in his throat.

"Well, here's a table," Pointed out Axel amiably enough, setting down his tray with a dull clatter. His counterpart hopped into a seat, and even in his distracted condition Axel couldn't help but notice his swinging legs beneath the table.

Like it was the greatest revelation of all time, he put out, "You know, we need to start getting you a kiddy chair."

Roxas flashed him another apathetic 'Go Die' expression, something related to a docile glare. "Always looking out for my good health, as usual."

"If so, then I should have told you to stop drowning your burger with ketchup. My goodness, you murdered your ham by doing that."

"I like ketchup. What's it to you? And it's hamburger, or burger – just not ham." He said, defending his right of drenching his food with what sometimes resembled blood.

For five minutes, Axel didn't eat. Roxas watched him studiously in between ( and occasionally during ) large bites of his burger. Finally, after a grandiose gulping swallow, he was ready to ask the daydreaming man sitting across the table what was up.

"Why do you look somewhere in between pensive, vacant, and stupid?" That was Roxas. Blunt and brutally honest.

Axel stirred, but only slightly. He at least withdrew his arm, which was supporting his cheek. "If I'm correct, vacant is a synonym of stupid."

The younger boy picked at his food idly. _You're avoiding the question_, his actions gave off.

"Well . . ." Long and drawn-out, his pause made it clear to Roxas that he was deciding whether or not he should tell him what was bothering him. _Best friends tell best friends everything_, he'd insist, and then Axel would be done for. "See that girl over there?" And almost cowering in his seat, Axel pointed a long and slender finger in her direction. Roxas looked over with vague interest, and Axel would have said his expression was vacant and stupid, right back at him.

"What about her?"

Axel looked shaken. "_What about her? _Well, she's _only_ the most beautiful girl in the world, Rox." _As if it isn't obvious._

Roxas made a face. It was either because of the feminine presence to his right, or the use of the unacceptable nickname. "Looks like an average girl to me."

Now Axel appeared positively shocked. "_Average!_ She's a fricken' _angel_!" In his heated passion, he slammed his fist down on a ketchup packet. The top split open on impact, squirting a stream of one percent tomato, eighty-two percent corn syrup, and seventeen percent distilled water on his friend's face.

Lifting a trembling arm, Roxas wiped it off with his fist, leaving a smear across the side of his head like an angry red scar. He was trying very hard not to simply kill Axel and leave his body in the restaurant. Instead of risking a life sentence in prison, he sunk further into his seat, causing him to look more like an elementary school student with his stunted height.

"I still don't see what's so special about some girl," He muttered, resting his chin upon the tabletop.

"That's because you're too young to understand _real_ love. You just have too many hormones marching daily parades in your body," Axel retorted, his lip curling in disdain. Roxas hardly thought love-at-first-sight was _real_ love – only in Hollywood, it seemed – but knew when to keep quiet.

About the details, anyway.

"You're crazy," He pointed out blatantly, showing no sympathy.

"You call it madness; I call it love."

Roxas rolled his china plate blue eyes, unconvinced by Axel's twisted philosophy. If love equaled insanity, well, then _he_ would certainly never fall into such a trap.

After a couple more minutes of staring ( Axel's green eyes softened adoringly, something Roxas would have never thought as possible for such crafty tom cat's eyes ), Axel suddenly pulled back his chair with a disturbing scraping racket and declared, "I'm going to go talk to her."

Though Roxas was nearly flailing at the loud noise that grated on his ears, the female presence only nodded slightly to herself, chin dipping to glance down listlessly at her table; as if she hadn't heard a thing.

"Why?" The blonde questioned. Then, "What's the point, Axel?" Expecting him to repeat back to him a pig-headed retort, '_Because I love her, dum-dum,'_ he opened his mouth for the third time. "You don't even know her."

"That's why I'm _going _to know her, my ever-questioning boy. I'm going to make her very well-known by me, I think." But it felt like, to him, that he already knew her.

With her silky crimson hair curtaining the side of her face, she didn't see the tall similar hair-coloured man approach her, but she _did_ see the brunette slide into the seat directly across from her, looked up, and was suddenly entrapped in his smile.

Axel came to a sudden and abrupt halt. The stranger, while he had charmed the girl into laughing, turned his attention to Axel, flashing him a smug smile that said '_I win_.'

In a small voice, his eyes wide and crestfallen, Axel all but squeaked from the corner of his tight-lipped mouth to his friend. "Is God peeing on me yet, Roxas?"

"Come on," Roxas snarled, leaping from his seat and snatching the older male's wrist, "before someone actually notices you." _You already made a fool of yourself in front of _me, he thought, dragging the zombie-walking young adult out of the restaurant and into the dark evening. _But since when have you not?_

"Roxas," He whined, drawing out the 'as' so that it could have been a nasal hiss instead of a child's complaint – '_Why can't I go and play on the jungle gym?_' "Now I have _competition._"

"A little of that never hurt you." It was true. Axel could beat one's ass at fighting – just ask their friend Demyx, who just recently got out of the hospital for calling his hair some vulgarity that Roxas didn't care to recall or remember. Just that one innocuous whiplash led to a scuffle that Demyx barely survived. Their friend the redhead ( not the one currently inside the building ) may have looked like a stick, but in actuality, he was composed of liquid steel.

So that was how Roxas was unsure why Axel couldn't just go and beat that little pimp up, with the ruffled brown hair and cuteish little boy smile that dug its way into his heart. Axel's sudden bout of weakness – what he called _love_ – was making him sick to his mind and stomach. All he wanted to do was go home and study a little for chemistry ( _isn't that what the call the sudden reaction of supposed attraction between two people? )_, and then call it a night.

But he still had Axel to deal with.

Who was staring forlornly into the tinted glass windows of the restaurant, right at the couple.

_Mental 'grah.'_

"Axel."

He turned those green cat's eyes back at him, but they were far-away, distant. "Huh?"

He let out a whistle of breath, eyelids fluttering in exhausted exasperation. He was about fed-up with Axel's ridiculous displays of lovesickness. "Go home."

This seemed to clear up the dreamy stare a little more proficiently. It was as if he just realized with a jolt: _But going home means I won't be able to stalk this girl? _His lip nearly trembled as his gaze wavered back to the forbidden window. _My God, his freaking _lip _is trembling. _Spotting this as a dire emergency, Roxas quickly began to add on perfectly valid reasons why Axel should get the heck away from the poor girl ( and from him ).

"You need sleep. See those bags under your eyes?" Axel made a perplexed expression that said, _Well no Roxas, I really can't. _So Roxas did the friendly thing and pushed him toward the window, shoving his hand into the spiky nape of his neck ( which he had to reach up a great distance for ) to see his reflection in the glass. Probably a bad idea, because that only made him ogle over the pair more. "You were sick with a virus last week. Why are you even out here anyway? It's cold. I'll call a cab." Roxas didn't care that he had asked Axel to come with him earlier. Recovering from a virus or no, Axel would have insisted to go anyway. It was tradition.

Without further ado, he began to fish through his pocket for his cell phone. Axel was staring at him indifferently, as if he had been speaking to him in gibberish ( which, in a way, he had ). Then he ( just as indifferently ) refocused the view the window gave him by turning back in that direction, ignoring his friend completely with his rapt silence.

Roxas's slender index finger worked to press a few buttons, but he gradually gave up and closed the compact cellular, remembering that it would be a waste. Axel's apartment was only a few blocks away. He'd call a taxi for himself later – or just walk.

He looked at Axel, who was looking at the couple of teens instead of his best friend, and sighed. _This is really beginning to get to me. Am I feeling – jealous? _Maybe not jealous – maybe just left out. Those two emotions seemed to be what Axel was feeling as he gazed helplessly into that window. _I guess we're even._

"Hey!" Axel's sudden outburst, a flare of anger scorching his voice, caused Roxas to jump out of his reverie.

"What?"

"Look!" Pointing roughly in the direction of Unnamed Fiend Number One and Unnamed Fiend Number Two ( Number One in Roxas' case, and Number Two for Axel's ), Roxas observed a sudden disruption inside the restaurant. The girl was taken aback when her partner seemed to say something either inappropriate or outrageous to her, and when he reached out to try and fondle her blood red locks, she strained away from his touch. Even from the distance, the two boys could see her cheeks flame a light pink – not from laughter or modesty, but from distress.

Roxas felt Axel tense further beside him. He turned his eyes up at the tall man and saw that his emerald eyes were narrowed, and full of flare and determination. "We've got to go save her!" The beginning of his sentence seemed slurred, as if he were going to say '_I've got to go save her_' instead.

His expression read, _Are you mad?_ But he remembered, _Oh, hold on, I already asked that question. _

"Just wait one minute, Axel. You're no hero."

It came out sounding harsher than he had intended. Actually, he might have actually intended it, to make him back off – subconsciously. He didn't even know he was going to say the last fragment of his speech until it slipped from his mouth like the simple breeze on a balmy spring's day.

Before Axel could hardly impulsively react – either by going all emotional ( down or angry ), or by dashing in to rescue the lovely maiden, his lithe form swayed, and without warning, collapsed. As he fell, he swayed towards Roxas, knocking into him and forcing him backwords. The last thing Roxas thought while his friend may have had some awareness left was _Damn, he's heavy, too._

_xxx._

Once Axel was recovered ( or at least figured he was – those nasty viruses took a while to die off ), he went to the mall. Alone.

_I don't need Roxas mothering me all the time, _He figured, _all though it _is_ sort of amusing._

But with the dull persistence of a headache thumping above his right brow, the incessant nagging Roxas had to offer was not something he'd like at the moment. The mall's constant undertone of murmuring was all he could handle without his medicine. Wasn't there a good ol' R&X here? Maybe he should stop by and pick up some more painkillers; he was almost out . . .

"Hey! Hey, Axel!"

_Oh jeeze; what now? _At first he assumed it was Roxas, who, by some ill-fated misfortune, happened to go to the mall the same day as he. But instead, he found himself looking at a cheery-looking brunette with hair as spiky as his own, waving his hand frantically in the air to get his attention over the sea of crowds. Not Roxas, but Roxas' cousin, Sora.

There wasn't too much of a difference.

"Hi," He said lamely, feeling his headache now more than ever as he strolled over to where the younger boy stood, albeit a little grudgingly. He lifted his brows to the store he was walking into, then at Sora's plain polo uniform.

"A shoe store? I thought you had a job at McDonald's." Axel started off, stuffing his hands into his pockets. It was a half casual, half nonchalant and half awkward gesture. Small talk wasn't something he enjoyed when a cavalry of pain was advancing to the frontlines in his brain.

But he _did _still detect the lingering effects of that medicine . . . maybe . . .

"This one pays better!" Smile smile. "I get a whole twelve cents more than I made at my last job!" For Sora, that seemed to be a great quantity of money. Once you lived on your own, Axel would even agree with him. Every cent counted to those pesky money-sucking rents.

It wasn't as though he missed the teen greeting him over-enthusiastically every time his stomach decided it was hungry and constantly asking him if he wanted fries with that, anyway.

"So, how're ya', Axel?"

"Eh, fine. Recovering." Shuffle shuffle.

"Oh yeah? Oh, yeah! Roxas told me over the cell phone that you fainted on him last night!"

". . . Yeah."

"And there was this girl at the restaurant . . ."

"Yeah."

Axel seemed to stare off into space now, no longer at Sora. The other's interest thoroughly piqued, he prodded, while motioning him further into the store to sit on a bench. Sora swiped the thing clean from socks and the tissue paper they used to stuff the shoes ( _to make them plump like cherries,_ Axel thought whimsically ), but the taller male sit had to pluck a limp sock from underneath him and toss it to the side. Once situated ( as comfortably as one could converse on a shoe-changing bench, I'd imagine ), Sora started back up amiably. "Well, man. Tell me about her!"

For a moment, Axel hesitated, groping for the right words. Then, once he began to explain what had happened – hinting heavily at the description of the enchanting girl – they seemed to flow easily from his mouth. Once he reached the part where the girl really came into play, he was even close to being animated.

After a while, Sora interrupted. "Hey, I know her. She goes to my high school. Her name is Kairi. We're friends!" Those four sentences were like a haven for Axel. Instantly he was gripped with hope and anticipation, but he forced himself to slow down.

"Kairi." His voice was automatic as he seemed to taste the name by saying it out loud. It was beautifully exotic, without the harsh 'x' sound in his own name. "Kairi, who? What's her last name?"

Axel almost thought Sora was too airy-headed to know his own friend's surname, but there was always a plus to every con. Honestly, how many Kairi's could there be in a relatively small, wealthy private school? Not that many girls deserved such a name.

"Kairi Kalamani."

The redhead soaked this valuable piece of information in silently, then, nearly forgetting that Sora was there, refocused. "Thanks."

"No problem; any time!" But now he was looking at him strangely, perhaps due to his frequent – and recent – excursions. "You really like her, don't you?"

Perhaps it was time to go. Axel only offered him an uncommitted shrug of his narrow shoulder and stood up to full height. "I've better get going. There's a pharmacy around this place, right?"

"Yeah . . ." Sora paused. "Axel," – He nearly winced at his name being spoken, – "you aren't taking drugs, are you?"

Hastily, Axel burst into laughter. It was so unexpected, and Sora was studying him quite seriously. He shouldn't have been surprised, since Sora always said random things, but it caught him off-guard anyway. "No! I mean, prescription drugs; well yeah." A hand reached up to absent-mindedly scratch the back of his head, fingers curling in his jutting out tresses.

"Oh." But still he sounded unconvinced. "I get it. Sorry I asked." Now _he_ seemed to be acting as the evasive one.

"Whatever," He lowered his hand and waved it in a dismissal to the subject. Then his mind flashed to his pills. Damn, he needed some. The headache was steadily getting worse.

But Sora brightened. That was the positive thing about him; he always recovered quickly from things, while Roxas would stay down for days. "Sure you don't wanna buy some shoes?"

_What do I need shoes for? _He thought, irritated. Though he bit his tongue, figuratively speaking, and instead lied through his teeth. "I don't even know what size I am."

"Aw, c'mon. Guys know their shoe sizes like girls know their cup sizes," Sora said, and literally clutched his belly and laughed. It earned a 'tch' of disbelief from Axel, not amused. Just the brief mentioning of the opposite gender triggered his memory to last night. Typical teenage crudeness that Sora had picked up either by his friends or his age; but why was he being so defensive? Roxas normally accused him of doing the same thing, and he was twenty one, three years past official adult age.

_Let's just say, I'm not myself. _

"You're _always_ the same, Axel," Sora said suddenly, nearly causing the recipient to jump. Had he somehow read his mind? No, he must have just mistaken his derisive sound as a snort of laughter.

_Painkiller,_ He thought as he walked out, _I _need _my painkiller._

_.xxx_

The pair of white paper bags rustled against each other, like two lovers whispering secrets into the cup of each other's ear. The bottles inside them rattled. It was music to his ears.

Carelessly, he dropped the small sacks onto the counter. There was no need to worry about the cylindrical bottles rolling out and shattering onto the floor, for the restraining creases and folds on the top of the bags prevented them from doing so. He disregarded these, however, and ripped into the sacks greedily, barely taking the time to peer inside before snatching a brown bottle up with his fist.

_Twist here, turn here, push there – it's all the same scenario, _He repeated inside his head, wrenching off the cap with ease. Its primary blue engravings etched lightly ( yet still noticeably ) into the top of the lid were both learned to the man and ignored.

He poured a goodish amount of red and white capsules into the palm of his hand ( _two or three or four or ten, what did it matter _), popped them into his mouth, and ran the faucet. The bubbly sink water rushed into his coffee mug with a satisfying _hiss-shhlrrp_, the sound a serpent made when attacking and then finally slurping up a mouse into its maw. Tossing his head back, Adam's apple standing out enticingly against his serpentine throat ( along with the beads of liquid that had splashed around his neck ), he swallowed all six pills down in a single gulp.

_Damn. _He dragged his sleeve across his mouth, refreshed. _I needed that._

The effects of the drugs wouldn't be triggered for another twenty-five minutes – when they reached Axel's stomach and began to disintegrate because of the acid, spraying chemicals to help fight the ( _cold? virus? disease? stress? _) – but the mental effects were already settling in. It was just the _need_ ( _the addiction_ ) that was a necessity.

He suddenly felt cool – very cool. The perspiration on his brow, the molecules of sweat, was nothing more than distant, icy pinpricks.

He looked to the answering machine; saw that the device was glaring red light at him. _You have ONE message waiting._

Brushing past the counter, his finger trailed lightly on the button that would make the mechanical voice blare at him, followed by ( hopefully ) a real yet recorded one.

"Pick up, goddammit. Why don't you have a cell phone?"

At the sound of his friend's voice, his lip twitched into what could have been the premature beginnings of either a sneer or a snarl in annoyance. Axel hadn't gotten a cell phone for two ( three ) reasons: one; because he couldn't afford it, two; because he didn't like what seemed like a necessity for the rest of the world at the time, and three; because he figured no one would ever call it anyway. Roxas only talked on the phone when he was forced, for instance. That was sometimes when Axel nagged him to, or when Sora called him to go on and on and on about his day in a fun-filled ( mainly ) one-sided conversation.

Or, when something was bothering him about Axel.

Axel could detect the worry in his voice, overruled by his natural ( and a little worked, this time ) frustration. But he made no move to pick up the phone and call him back. Instead, he flopped down on the couch, sinking into the loose support with as much dignity as possible ( when you were stoned and basking on a ratty couch, that is ). He sat like that for quite a while, his back pressed into the faux patched leather and eyes either drifting down into oblivion or glaring ahead blankly. After the first five minutes, his cat, Fluffy Butt – a half-persian, half-something – meowed indigently and leapt up on his lap. The throaty, deep rumble of his purring was all that could be heard until the phone rang again.

And rang.

And rang.

_Ring, ring ring ring ring, BANANA-phone, _He thought spontaneously, causing him to shift a little in his seat, under the fifteen-pound weight of his ( perhaps overfed ) cat. What movie was that from? Did he make it up?

While he was cautiously pondering this, the answering machine ran with a short, speedy blabber of his voice. Something like 'Hey, not here, leave a message.' Yes, something like that. Axel decided he needed to change it soon, because it was so old. Of course, that would mean taking the physical duty of getting up and dissembling parts of the machine, and slaving over what he should say . . .

_Beep._ "Sora called. He said you were at the mall today. He also said that you were acting funny. I'm coming over."

_And that, my friend, is the end of the message. _He didn't give one way or the other whether Roxas was coming over to baby-sit him or not. He would just make it clear that his help wasn't needed.

Help; that was something he needed though, wasn't it? _I need to be rescued from this fucked-up disease called _real_ love._ Of course, he avoided the real truth – his evasiveness seemed to be a disease as well. Though what he was doing now – _deteriorating _himself with drugs – diminished his courage, he still had a strange determination that caused him to pursue anyone, anything – even if it wasn't worth reaching.

He should have felt a flare of anger rising up from the depths of his being because of Sora. Sora, and his big blabbermouth. But he felt none. Though he knew that Roxas' cousin probably wasn't the best choice to animatedly rant about his infatuation with some girl

( "_Some girl? She's a fricken' _angel!" )

to, it was still his own damn fault.

His own . . . damn . . . fault.

Axel sunk lower on the sofa more so than even possible, glowering down at his tawny-hued cat. Fluffy stared back up at him with wide owl's eyes, innocent as day.

Axel heard himself sigh.

"Do you want to know a story, Fluffy?" The golden rims around his eyes become all the more clearer as their entirety widened. "I bet you do. So there's this guy, and he's up to his neck in crocodiles, all because of this one girl. Scratch that; it's his own doing. He shouldn't put the blame on her just because she was there, and just because he meet her – though he didn't even meet her, dammit – but he does anyway, just because he feels like general shit. Learn a lesson from me, Butt," His name was punctuated by another meow of appreciation for being acknowledged, "and you'll hopefully never go wrong in life.

"What," The redhead crooned as the cat continued to stare up at him, mesmerized, "do you think about that?"

The feline wiggled its ass in the air suddenly, as if it wanted to play. 'Play' in Fluffy Butt's vocabulary could have been abruptly clawing at Axel's torso, if it was within reach. Instead he made a cheerful, cunning sound – '_Brrrp_!' – and batted at his leg, claws hidden within their sheaths.

Axel seemed to take this as a clue, and further tried to decipher what the cat might be trying to tell him. He remembered suddenly that Sora had told him her full name. _Kairi. Kairi Kalamani. _

"Think I should call her?" By her he of course meant Kairi.

At this inquiry, Fluffy Butt retreated back to his lap and began to roll around on it luxuriously, purring like a freight engine. The answer was most obviously _yes_!

He dumped the cat onto the floor ( who continued to roll around, unaware of the change of surface area ) and stalked to the small ( and incredibly cramped ) closet located off to the side of the kitchen. Within it were mainly coats, a vacuum, and a stack of phone books. He received one a month, practically, so he had six for the half a year he'd stayed there.

Choosing one – the topmost of the batch – he rapidly leafed through the delicate yellow pages, searching for the K's. Finding them, he ran his finger down the list, until it rested beneath the double K'd name.

Except it wasn't Kairi. It was _Kalani_ Kalamani. What a tongue-twister – and brain-twister as well.

Then he remembered that Kairi was only sixteen and wouldn't have her own name in the phone book – instead she'd have her parent's. _Whoops. Just got a little ahead of myself._

He lugged the heavy phonebook and now the wireless phone back to the couch, careful not to lose the page he was in the thousands that were in the volume. Then he sat there and stared down at the pair on his lap, unmoving.

A minute ticked by.

Then another.

And then another.

His breath fingered out from his mouth in a sigh. _Yeah. I can't do this._

Axel had never been so fucking _timid_ in his life. He never would have assumed he'd do this – but this was _real_ love, right?

It made people do funny things.

( ". . . _Said that you were acting funny_." )

But Axel didn't _feel_ very funny. In fact, his mouth felt very dry.

_xxx._

"Where would you like to go?" The taxi driver questioned, but instead it came out sounding like _'Vere would yew liek tu goe_?_' _with his thick Middle Eastern accent.

Roxas, glaring knives into the back of the man's turban, held back a rather rude retort by literally biting his tongue. "I _told_ you already. Avenue K. I want to go to _Avenue K_," He said, enunciating the last syllables deliberately, as one would try to explain something to a kindergartener – or a foreigner. He tried to convince himself that he wasn't the least bit frustrated.

_Axel could be doing something stupid right now, _He thought, _and it's all this thick-headed driver's fault. _But that wasn't quite true. Axel was to blame if he did something stupid, right? Like that one time when he burned a shack down out in the country, somewhere behind his family's ranch estate. He and Axel both came from families that were rich – the core of the families, at least. But they – the relatives, the branches – were just about as normal as pie. For example, Roxas' cousin, Sora, was rich and went to a private school. Roxas lived in a small house and went to a crowded public school. And Axel's family had a history of prestigious cattle driving ( "_Yeah, as _prestigious_ as herding a bunch of shit-makers can be_," Axel had once said ), but there had been some sort of qualm and he and his mother had gotten more or less disowned.

But this was more important by setting fire to a run-down tool shed. _His _life_ could be at stake. _

Now, don't think that Roxas was going to jump in and save his friend's life. It was like the situation at the restaurant the night before – Axel wasn't hero enough to intervene in some else's life. Neither was Roxas.

Axel would have to figure it out himself. Roxas would just give him a little push.

_When push comes to shove . . . _

"Here," Stated the driver, startling Roxas out of his mulling thoughts. He looked out the window and at the bleak apartment façade, the beginning of a frown tugging at the corner of his lips.

He paid the driver, got out of the car, and advanced up the steps towards Axel's door. His hand dipped into his pocket briefly, and when it showed up again, the blinking of keys was clutched within it. Axel never should have given Roxas key to his apartment, but he was a careless person. Always lending things to others ( without really saying he was doing so ), always mixing his stuff up.

Opening the door ( that should have been heavier – it's what you get with a low rental cost ) without bothering to make it quiet – this wasn't some spy movie, this was _real life _– he walked inside. The first compartment was dark, lighted only by a dim lamp in the living room.

"Axel?"

His voice seemed to echo for a moment, and then died away, as if carried by an imaginary wind.

"What the – oh, hello, cat," He muttered, feeling something large and furry rubbing against his pants leg. The honey-hued eyes watched him from the floor, two orbs of liquid golden light. They were somehow unsettling – beautiful, yet ominous all the same – so he moved on.

On the counter, an object caught Roxas' attention.

A pill bottle?

"Was this what Sora was talking about?" He said under his breath, wondering if Axel was around to hear him. Maybe he wasn't home, after all, and his previous intuition had failed him. But Roxas knew better – he never doubted his sixth sense, which he had come to rely on after many years of hardships.

With an unwary hand, he gripped the small cylindrical tube around the middle and picked it up, turning it so he could read the prescription on the side. The warnings label mentioned side-effects of dizziness, disorientation, and false notions. Nice stuff.

_So this is why he's been acting so strange lately, _He gathered, _and all this Kairi stuff. _If so, then they should also put on the label '_May also cause 'love at first sight.''_

Roxas brushed away from the counter and continued to explore deeper into the depths of Axel's home. He had been here on numerous occasions, but none of them could have accounted for feeling so . . . empty. Desolate, even. The once tangent curtains fluttered like ghosts before the door leading to out back, which was slightly ajar.

He hesitated.

_Well, go ahead. What do you think you will find but Axel? What harm could he possibly do in the back of an apartment? What are you afraid of? _His mind, dubious as ever, critically told him to keep his composure. _Just keeping my cool, man_ – he would have said, years ago.

Cool was the wind that caressed the side of his pale face, the breeze coming from outside.

After walking towards the sliding glass door, he slid it further, enough to just barely squeeze his trim body through.

_Well, here goes nothing._

_.xxx_

Overstepping the plump feline stretched out on the floor, Axel drew back the screen that led to his 'patio.' Being on the first floor had its pros and cons – there was no fence to mark his property, and the open slab of concrete led to the apartment complex's outdoor pool. It was a decent size, for a place that couldn't wrack up a million dollars a year – and in the evening it was like a lake, trembling cerulean glass with a silent calm.

Axel walked, like a spectre, to the edge of the pool. His thin silhouette swayed ever so slightly, as if being beckoned by the breeze. The fronts of his boots stopped just before the tender concrete lip of the depression, fluttering precariously close to the edge like butterflies gracing the tips of their antennae with the skim surface of the water.

In his right hand, dangling and held loosely within his grasp ( though he held on tight, all the same – clung to it like his lifeline, his last chance, his final regard ), was his phone. It dropped a shadow down on the foundation even during the late hour, stretching south towards its home. It yearned for its cradle where it couldn't rock, could only do so when being held wildly by its user. The shadow therefore reached, but never actually _reached_, for how could a shadow reach when it was inanimate? Without form? Unreal?

Axel raised the wireless phone and studied it carefully for a full moment.

Roxas watched, unnoticed, from behind.

Then he gradually lowered it back down again.

Still watching, waiting.

He let it drop.

The phone sunk to the pristine alabaster bottom of the pool – the deep end – and disappeared into the darkened sapphire depths.

Roxas let out a breath. He thought he heard Axel do the same. Both were the cause of unanimous relief.

"I should clap," He started, "but I don't always think that throwing away forty dollars is a good thing."

"If you start a round of applause, I may have to shoot you."

Roxas shuffled his feet and made an uncommitted 'mmph' of noise.

When Axel didn't speak for another ponderous minute, Roxas further approached him and cupped his hand firmly on the man's shoulder. He nearly had to stand on his tippy-toes to do it, which would have caused a comical laugh to come from his friend, if he wasn't feeling the way he was.

"Hey, buddy," The blonde uttered quietly. "You did the right thing."

_The fuck I did, _Was all Axel could think. _I feel as if I just threw my entire life away with a forty dollar phone. The fuck I did._

When he felt Roxas bury his spiky head lightly in the concave curve of his side, the tall redhead felt a ripple of tension roll up his spine – then when it passed, so did the unpleasant feeling. Roxas seemed to sense this and withdrew, switching his liquid royal gaze up at Axel.

Innocence filled his question. "What do you feel like doing?" In truth, he was curious as to what Axel might be feeling. Did he feel pushed to do this, to forget this girl, because his friend wanted him to? Obviously he seemed dejected, but Roxas wouldn't comment on that.

Axel's fingers twitched lightly at his side. He continued to alternatively stare out forewords and towards Hell, his vision split in half and divided evenly between the two.

"Burn stuff," The corner of his mouth was pulled back in a grimace as he said it; "I feel like burning stuff."

_xxx._

They hauled the stacks of phonebooks outside by the pool – two towers constructed for false idols rather than for God – and set them down in a pile. They would make excellent fire fodder.

Axel took out the lighter – not one made for smokes, since he avoided that with all revulsion – but a device mainly used to start up barbeques. He flicked the part which triggered the flame, and it suddenly blew out of the slender muzzle of the torch, licking the pages of a phonebook like the tongue of a sappy dog.

The pages caught fire. It began to spread as the leaves were still curling, burning, turning black and deteriorating into ash. Soon the yellow flame covered the entire stack like a blanket, crackling noisily, greedily, and devouring the million pages.

They both stood back, watching it. _Like watching my fricken' life die away_, Axel thought.

_Like watching all my problems fade away, _Roxas thought.

But problems aren't resolved by just the simple flame of destruction. Things could not be created nor destroyed; they were simply recycled.

Axel felt like he was tumbling around in that cycle, an unwary suspect, trapped.

_.xxx_

Axel continued to avoid Roxas as much as possible.

He locked himself up in his apartment, and told him ( whenever he was able to get through to him, that was ) that he wasn't feeling very well still – the bug seemed to have come back. Roxas had forgotten to talk to him about the pills, and kept on forgetting. But those few times when he remembered, he always felt a surge of anger towards himself – and towards Axel, for avoiding the issue.

At least there was no more mentioning of Kairi.

The silence within Axel's home was bliss; without a phone, no one could contact him. They all had to come to his door ( or through it, in Roxas' case ). This went on for a while, until he decided to emerge from his cage once more.

Then he saw her.

The swatch of cherry-coloured hair was much more brilliant with the backdrop of a bright blue sky rather than the dull artificial light of a restaurant. Her lips stood out the same way her smooth hair did; the same hue as well, as if painted glossy with the pulp of a crushed pomegranate. He was closer to her now, and with her advancing in his direction, he could see the shards of violet glass within her blue eyes. They were intense, their edges sharp, but still broken.

_I could compare those with the sky, _He thought. _If only the sky could amount to such beauty._

He had thought about her day and night since the small bonfire in the back of his apartment; Roxas was oblivious to it. Axel could hide things if he wanted to – he had the enigmatic quality, the manipulative skill. He had thought, if only I could see her again. If only she would notice me. Then maybe I wouldn't be so damn _scared_ all the time.

But he was too messed-up to ever be noticed by such an unflawed being, he knew. What could a perfectly intelligent, stunningly lovely girl of sixteen ever want with a low-down junkie who got high off of prescribed medicine ( and occasionally Tylenol PM )? Not to mention the difference in ages, which Roxas would most likely point out.

The young man began to shuffle out of the way, seeking refuge behind the corner of a shop, but his actions were drugged – not because of what he had taken before coming outside, but because of her image. Her very _presence_ was what made his lifeline stutter – that was it; that was the key, the answer the universe, the answer to all his problems.

His green eyes painfully traced her slim, smoothly muscled legs, bare beneath a short white skirt that swished around the middle of her thighs. They then raised to her flat stomach, a strip of white flesh uncovered by her halter top, and then moved back to her face ( though not without skipping over the rest of the package on the way, he wasn't shamed to admit ). But they did not rest there; instead they locked on her hand, which was entwined with the guy from the restaurant's.

He felt a brief flash of anger. Why was she still hanging around with that kook? ( No, he did not care to say that he was one as well. ) From the slight line that could be mistaken as a frown in the distance set upon her lips, she didn't seem happy with the choice of partnership.

Axel was just rounding the corner when her sparkling tanzanite eyes swung in his direction and looked right at him. He froze like a deer in a pair of headlights, and she seemed to do the same as well. Her lips parted ever so slightly, as if she were about to say something following a sudden enchanting epiphany, when her boyfriend tugged her into a popular clothing store.

There he was, left standing in their dust, hearing the ghosts of their voices carried to his ears by the wind.

"_C'mon Kairi, let's go in here."_

"_But, I don't –"_

"_I'll buy you a new outfit . . ."_

_xxx._

"Hey Axel!" This was the chipper voice that greeted him on the other line. Roxas had convinced him to finally buy a cell phone, now that it was a month since he threw his last one in the pool.

And he was recovering.

"Did you have fun on your vacation, Sora?" He drawled noncommittally into the speaker, relaxing back on his couch and twirling his finger around Fluffy Butt's ear, which persisted to flicker like the interrupted flame of a candle.

It was as if he could _hear_ his friend's grin widening without seeing him. "Yes! Paris was excellent. We saw the Waffle Tower –"

"Eiffel Tower."

No more pills.

"—and went to a lot of boring museums. But besides that, it was the spiff."

"Don't use that sort of language with me, please. It hurts my aging ears."

"It was überly spiffy." After saying this taunt, Sora laughed good-naturedly.

No more . . .

"Hey, do you remember Kairi, that girl you were interested in?"

Kairi?

". . ." There was a severe silence on Axel's side of the line. Before Sora could ask if something had happened to him, the redhead finally spoke, his voice on the edge of threatening.

"I'm not interested anymore," He said dryly. It was a lie.

"Oh." Sora's voice had grown proficiently quieter. Then; "Well, I got a letter from her while I was gone. She was talking about this tall guy with spiky red hair and green eyes with tattoos under them, and I wrote back saying it was you. It was, wasn't it?"

"If you say so," Axel put out, sounding uninterested. But in truth, he had scooted to the edge of his seat with anticipation.

"Well, she replied and said she really wanted to meet you – she just never got the chance before since you always slipped her by," The younger boy explained. "I thought that was kinda cool. I mean, she likes you, you know? Like how you were when you talked to me in Nice Fit about her –"

"That's really oh-so charming, Sora, but I no longer care." He flattened his other hand out and ruffled Fluffy's head with it. "You see, I've moved on with a little something called life. If she still wants to meet me; fine. But don't you think she's got her eyes set on someone a little too unattainable?" His apple green eyes glittered like jewels in the dusky light of his apartment. The show of arrogance was just the side-effect of his excitement.

Sora chuckled, a rusty sound on the other side of the line due to an abrupt burst of static. "Yeah, with my cousin always clinging to you, that is – she probably assumed you were already taken. Hard-to-get gay men and all make the women go wild –"

"I'll put your family out of business for that."

"How? You gonna burn down our office building?"

"Why not?" Axel had pulled out an orange Bic lighter and was now flicking it over and over again, studying the flame with an absent eye. "I've got _years_ of experience."

"Yeah, of burning down shacks a fiftieth of size . . ."

"I try to embellish the facts and stray away from the truths, thank you very much."

"That's a bad habit." He paused. "Anyway, I've got to go. You'll drop by the mall and see me tomorrow, right?"

"Maybe." He considered, toying with the idea. "_If _I feel like it."

"Whatever." Another laugh. "See ya'." _Click._

Kairi, he thought.

I can't believe you finally know me, and it wasn't even my doing.

Well, let's see how long that'll last.

Axel picked up his bag and walked out the door.

_.xxx_

The restaurant was relatively crowded tonight, so he couldn't immediately scout out a shock of red hair when he entered.

He shouldered past the clusters of people that seemed to prefer lingering and talking instead of sitting down and eating, and went to take a seat.

In the past, Kairi had appeared here on numerous occasions – more so often, it seemed, after Sora claimed that she had noticed him. But Axel always found ways to escape from her gaze just in the nick of time.

Tonight, maybe his chance would come. He felt bold – bolder than he had in months ( since first laying eyes on her ).

If not, then there were always other days. He felt as though he had all the time in the world to wait.

He wouldn't run anymore.

Minutes ticked by; he decided to get up and get something to eat.

As he was retreating back to his table, his ears suddenly pricked up.

"_Kairi Kalamani, a young woman of sixteen . . ._"

The news was playing on the TV in the corner of the room.

"_Was found dead in her house this afternoon . . ._"

He froze.

"_The cause of death being multiple stab wounds through the back . . ._"

"_It is said she bled to death . . ._"

His mouth went dry; not even the soda in one hand would be able to quench it.

"_The suspect – Kalamani's boyfriend – has already confessed to the murder, and will be tried a week from today . . ._"

He knew then that he shouldn't have waited.

_When it all comes crashing._

.xxx.

. . Whoo, that was long. Probably the longest oneshot in history ( in _my _history, anyway ).  
If you read it all, please tell me what you think in a much-appreciated review? ♥


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